Case's Build Thread (06 LJ)

At least you're starting out positively

Get the garage organized before you tear into this. It will get bad enough during the project but if you start with it in bad shape you'll spend more time chasing your tail around the garage trying to find this or that.

This isn't a budget build on pirate. I didn't pull out my phone and run through my contact list until I found the number for the vendor selling the very latest in axles built from unobtanium and capable of surviving a fall from low earth orbit. My axles did not get overnighted to me in a crate that emitted light and the heavenly sound of angel choirs when I opened it.

Instead I headed out to my shop (AKA the Cash Family Storage Unit) where I happened upon a 1976 International Scout which just happened to have a 14 bolt under it. Since it was obvious the owner of this vehicle had abandoned it, I quickly yanked the axle. Another person on this board happened to sell me a dana 60 so I bought that.

When I announced my initial plans, I was met with derision and laughter from the much much older member of this board known only as 98TJ. He spake unto me, "Yea verily, yon 14 bolt doth drag itself across rocks and preventeth you from further egress. Mere 40 inch tyres hath not the clearance to carry yonself onward and upward". (this is how old people talk).

My 88 year old grandmother whom I love dearly taught me to always listen to my elders for they are wiser and better than me in every way. So I heeded the wise advise of 98TJ and proceeded to choose the only obvious solution: shaving the 14 bolt.

Now the previous owner had shaved off about 1" from the bottom of this behemoth. He only stopped shaving when he encountered the bottom bolt hole of the housing. In order to ensure the seal of his diff cover he stopped here. Hounded by my critics, I put the 14 bolt on sawhorses and bought probably the greatest tool mankind has made, besides fire and accelerator pedals: the sawzall.

The result:







That's it for now. Stay tuned for more pitiful updates with minuscule progress. Also, stay tuned for these important messages brought to you by:

CASE DALTON'S USED 4x4 PARTS EMPORIUM. We sell used crap so you don't have to buy new! Our parts are guaranteed to be thoroughly tested in the most extreme conditions!!!

Case wrote: This isn't a budget build on pirate. I didn't pull out my phone and run through my contact list until I found the number for the vendor selling the very latest in axles built from unobtanium and capable of surviving a fall from low earth orbit. My axles did not get overnighted to me in a crate that emitted light and the heavenly sound of angel choirs when I opened it.

Funny stuff.

Since I seem to be the primary hand model for much of this build thread, I suppose I am qualified to respond to technical questions...

The ring gear will require a slight shave. Likely we will grind the offending material off parallel to the new housing bottom plate. The required material removal is very minimal and will be well outside the pinion contact patch.

Edited by JRTOffroad - 18 January 2010 at 4:00am

JRTOffroad wrote: Since I seem to be the primary hand model for much of this build thread, I suppose I am qualified to respond to technical questions...

aaaOOOOOOOah aaaOOOOOah ALERT - this means that the writer of the thread is not doing the work himself. Therefore, this thread is cast into the eternal lake of fire along with all the others which have denied their likeness to the Pirate Budget Build genre. I call hollerin "do it yourself" then having someone else do it for you!!!!

PS what are you doing with your rubi axles?

alabamatoy wrote: aaaOOOOOOOah aaaOOOOOah ALERT - this means that the writer of the thread is not doing the work himself. Therefore, this thread is cast into the eternal lake of fire along with all the others which have denied their likeness to the Pirate Budget Build genre. I call hollerin "do it yourself" then having someone else do it for you!!!! PS what are you doing with your rubi axles?

Haha! I like this logic, my mere appearance in a build thread photo establishes me as the labor force! And to think, I thought my official title was VP of Alcoholic Beverage Consumption.

ATM ON WHEELS wrote: hey you shaving ring gear to and are you shaving straight across or at the pinion angle

the bottom plate should be flat with a pinion angle of ~15 degrees.

Glad to see you doing a build thread on this. That's gonna be a sweet ride when you're done with it.

[QUOTE=NOT4HWY] Ok-educate me. I've trimmed several 14 bolts before but how are you going to get the cover to seal properly?[/QUOTE

i'll purchase a weld together kit and trim to fit the cover to the housing. 2 nuts will be welded into the housing to create 2 additional places to secure hardware. It may not seal 100% but I'll settle for 99%   

Case, as you begin your hunt for repair and modification parts, I would like to state the 1947 Farmall Tractor under my shed is not available.  Even though it looks as if it would be available to part out, it is not.   I know the rear axel and tires would provide the lift you are seeking and the axel would be tank strong, but you must seek elsewhere.

Case wrote: scoutman wrote: Case, as you begin your hunt for repair and modification parts, I would like to state the 1947 Farmall Tractor under my shed is not available.  Even though it looks as if it would be available to part out, it is not.   I know the rear axel and tires would provide the lift you are seeking and the axel would be tank strong, but you must seek elsewhere. I was searching for metal to weld to the bottom of the shaved 14 bolt.  Most shaved 14 bolts call for 3/8" to 1/2" metal to be used for the bottom plate. metal that thick is expensive.  being a budget build i figured i could just cut the pieces I needed out of the sheet metal of the left over scout body in my shop and sandwich the sheetmetal until it was thik enough.  should work right?

Case, I know I have some 1/2" steel plate and I might have some 3/8".  How much do you need?

I hope he already has it cause we're supposed to weld it up tomorrow. If not then y'all may get a call.

Preheat,weld, wrap the housing so it cools slowly.

http://www.lincolnelectric.com/knowledge/articles/content/castironpreheat.asp

 

 

Very interesting build thus far. Btw Case I liked your old people speak.

98TJ wrote: How do you plan on welding to the cast iron housing.  I have never tried that.  Seems like I read something about preheating to 500 degf and using a nickle rod or something.

i don't plan on welding anything.  I can't weld (yet).  I'm paying JRTOffroad (Jordan) with beer that tastes like pine trees to weld for me.

Welding is something I really want to learn, but don't have the equipment to learn on nor the time.  I plan on learning this as soon as I can, but for now, I will have to depend on others.

This is not the kind of project I want to learn on.  For that I'll wait until i'm building swingsets for orphans or something.

Any progress is good man ! it's an awesome feelin

bluetoy wrote: Looking good Case. It's getting better with every jeep part that you remove.

scoutman wrote: We're making sparks and burning eyebrows!

For the record...he stepped into my line of FIRE!

scoutman wrote: Center line to the bottom of the 14 bolt is 5" which is the same as his old 44!

...and probably weighs twice as much!

scoutman wrote: I'll get some picts up.

Hurry up already!

Case, I wish I could have been there! Looking good, and progressing nicely!

If your still working on it next time by spring break Case Ill be happy to come help.

hardbody1 wrote: If your still working on it next time by spring break Case Ill be happy to come help.

I'm not sure when spring break is, but if we're working on it, I'll give you an invite.

That being said, if you need anything done to your rig, this seems the way to go.  With about 6-10 guys we accomplished in less than 12 hours what would have taken me months to do.  It set me back a few hundred in beer and food, but I think everyone had a great time.  Nobody left early, the girls only got in 1 or 2 fights and we nearly geared 2 axles with associated prep work including welding spiders, welding housings, and welding scary press up.  (I should have done a build thread on just this.)


This is what scary press ended up as:



It started off as the 130 dollar press from Harbor Freight, but after several years of hard use, it was starting to bend and twist in 'interesting" ways.  There were several times where I was sure that J$ killed himself while trying to press something with it.  After a few mods, it was much more reliable.  We welded the top plate in place, changed the jack, and modified the plate the jack pushes against.

While this is my build thread and my way of doing things, I sincerely believe that more activities like this, would be hugely beneficial to the club.  Not only would some club member get a major upgrade done quickly, but we would all have fun doing it at the same time.  I didn't know how this would go so I didn't invite the whole club, but after this test run I'm fully confident that this would be a great club activity.  8ish people was not enough to finish the keg off, but was just enough to get things done.  everyone seemed to have a good time, everyone was involved, and we laughed and had a good time for 12+ hours. 

Job well done. It's always a fun night when you get several people together to work on a project ! More fun with beer but it tends to slow progress after awhile. lol

Should be brazed if you wanna do it by the book for max strength. Ive seen Dad cut the ears off a Heep 4 speed and braze new ones on so it could be adapted to a Chevy bellhousing so my buddy could run a 350 . My 2 pennys

JRTOffroad wrote:  I don't believe it lends its self to an application where the joint will be subjected to repeated contact with hard objects (mall speed bumps).

Case wrote: I wish you could have been there to. Most important, for all of us reading this thread, is for us to realize that things like this are only possible because of the sacrifices made by all of our armed forces. Maybe when you get back, we'll get to do it again.  Until then, thank you and your family for all you do for me and mine.

Jake, I'm not sure what happened.  Someone was welding on the housing while it was hot and I think the glove drew up when that happened.  Send me a link to the pair you want to replace them with and I'll get you a new set ASAP.

I didn't know MechanicsWear made anything like that.  Interesting, but I think that may be a bit much.

Edited by cj8lvr - 27 January 2010 at 8:14am

85cruiser wrote: Case love the build so far. Old people speak that part kills me I wish I was there to help and especially there to wheel with you when its done. I'm afraid I would break something since you'll be runnin Dana 60/14FF and I have no intention of swapping out the cruiser axles anytime soon.  Keep it up man

I still want to wheel up there with you.  Don't think I have forgotten about it.  One day when I have the funds I'll pull it off

J CROSS wrote: Case, nice build, looks like fun.  I don't mean to get off subject but I have a question. What is the measurement eye to eye on your current front lower links? I think your build will almost be strong enough to match your driving habits .   Thanks

I'm in the warm, cozy house for now.  I'll try and remember to measure this for you tomorrow

If your going to do a lot of this kinda stuff you should get one of these dickies jackets. They hold up very well. http://www.dickies.com/product/product_detail.jsp?FOLDER%3A%3Afolder_id=2534374302024402&PRODUCT%3A%3Aprd_parent_id=1408474395181237&PRODUCT%3A%3Aprd_id=845524441762634&ADD_CART_ITEM%3A%3AATR_Sku_Size=_ Unfortunately it looks like they got rid of all their clearance ones. They had some in odd sizes and colors for $15.

It looks like your making good progress. If you need anything, give me a shout.

I also use this leather welding apron to keep the sparks off  http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=94128
You can't beat the price.

Loving this build!

Them some purty welds

Case, you are getting better! This is the first update without carnage of some kind! LOL!

Case wrote: This axle will be for sale when I get back from King of the Hammers.

Case, when are you coming out to the Hammers this week? I'll try to link up with you, the back(east) side of the Hammers is the
base I'm on right now.

Mike

mikeanddepsy wrote: Case wrote: This axle will be for sale when I get back from King of the Hammers. Case, when are you coming out to the Hammers this week? I'll try to link up with you, the back(east) side of the Hammers is the base I'm on right now. Mike

Mike,  we'll be out there thursday night for the race on friday.  We might stay saturday night or head back out depending on what's going on.  I'll be flying into arizona Wednesday night and driving out to the hammers with a friend of jordan's, then driving back to arizona to fly back on sunday.

Case wrote: Like the old joke says, "Turn her over, son!"  Doesn't that thing go on the bottom, or is this a new jeep approach where you protect your driveline from bashing on the underside of the body?

Edited by alabamatoy - 07 February 2010 at 5:56am

Bring the kids 

Case wrote: Another thing that got done was welding together the DIY 14 bolt cover.

Two questions:
Where did the cover come from?
How is the bottom going to be bolted to the housing, or is it? - I see no bolt holes down there.

I'm back finally.

In case you were wondering if I died somehow while working on my Jeep, I regret to inform you that no, I am indeed alive and well.  This intermission was brought to you by my recent trip to the King of the Hammers in Johnson Valley California.  I know this is not really related to the build, but this is my thread so you can just deal with it. 

Jordan and I departed HSV on Wed. night heading for Phoenix.  The plan was to hook up with a friend of his with a 4x4 and drive to Johnson Valley about 5 hours outside phoenix on thursday.  A couple of other members from this board were already heading out there and were renting an rv.  We agreed to meet up with them and split the cost of the rv in exchange for a dry place to sleep.

When we first arrived at Johnson Valley we marveled at the size of the town that had sprung up.  We wasted no time and headed straight for the vendor's show.  I quickly found the ballistic fabrications truck and spent my 401k:



Now to find a warm place to sleep!

Our instructions were to find the "Rental RV" 50 yards from the Off Road evolution trailer in the vendor's area.  No problem right?  Well, it turns out there had to be 200 of these rental rvs out there and so many vendor trailers that we couldn't ever find the RV.  Arlan was trapped up in the mountains outside cell signal fixing a broken rig so we made dinner in the cold.  Lacking even the most basic preps we managed to cook up a fine suppper with a grill, a knife, a ratchet, and a screwdriver:




Don't get between me and my dinner, I will find a way to eat.

After settling down to spend the night sleeping in the sub 40 degree desert night we finally managed to hook up with Arlan and scramble to the RV.  (which happened to be in a cluster of rental rvs that looked identical that we had driven past 4 or 5 times in our search for Arlan) The rest of our crew arrived later that evening and we settled in.  The RV was advertised to comfortably sleep 7 adults.  There were 6 of us and we found that it actually comfortably slept 3 adults.  Just like the pictures of fast food vs what you actually get.  As tight as it was, we were warm and dry and therefor it was worth it.

The next morning was race day and we set off for the starting line to catch some action:


I was so excited, i forgot to take good pictures.  I was also tired that I completely forgot to call Mike, which I must apologize for.  I realize that you said you probably couldn't make it out there on Friday due to your kids being out of school, but I had your number in my phone and I completely forgot to call you  

We spent the rest of the day blasting across the desert in a borrowed 1991 ford bronco with busted front hubs, desperately trying to keep ahead of the fast moving racers.  We watched the race from the start line, then aftershock, then chocolate thunder, then sledgehammer.  Here are some pics:







It's hard to see what was going on in the last pic due to all the people in the way, but it was a pretty popular past time for the racers.  Any time someone rolled or broke on an obstacle, the next driver would simply driver over him. This lead to many fantastic passes and some pretty good drama too!

Here is a pic of "Hammertown":



There was an estimated 40,000 people attending this race

After the race was over we drove back to Phoenix and attempted to leave via plane on Sunday.  Well, as many as you know some snow came in about then. ( I wouldn't know it was sunny and 70 in Arizona ).  All flights in or around the south east were grounded.  We were stranded.  We ended up having to stay an extra day to await the next flight.  We actually got to fly into Memphis.  Our plane left on time and landed ahead of schedule.  I had an awesome seat and life couldn't get any better.  Except they canceled our connecting flight to HSV after delaying it an hour.  The next flight was supposed to leave until 730pm tomorrow.   We wanted to be in HSV today.  Delta airlines was sorry for the inconvenience and we were politely invited to go screw ourselves.

Jordan and I decided to just rent a car and drive back home.  Turns out everyone else had the same idea.  NO rentals available from any company anywhere near memphis.  We were stuck.  Except for:



OH YEAH!!  We were pimpin in our 16' box van.  After spending a few minutes loading up our cargo, we were off:



We drove/slid our way back to HSV late this evening and I am officially wupped.  If anyone needs to move something in a box van tomorrow afternoon, let me know.  I have this bad boy until then!

 I still don't have any clothes or any of my other luggage.  I still don't know if Delta will refund me for the flight they canceled.  Time will tell.  My money is on lost luggage and no refund.

Despite the travel problems, the race was awesome and a welcome vacation from constant work in the garage.  I got to see some cool rigs and meet some amazing people.  Everyone famous in this sport was there and the race was incredible.  I picked up some needed parts for my Jeep at a pretty good price and now I'm ready to start making some progress again.

Looks like an absolute blast. 

Or snowed on...

I lived in Prescott, AZ for a while.  It was interesting to leave the house with snow on the ground and 20 degrees and drive a little over an hour to Phoenix and see the folks walking around in shorts and T-shirts.

Why don't you rebuild the rubi rear end and swap both of them under the red TJ. You could have a spare jeep for a couple of hundred $$$ and some time. You could always sell if you didn't use it at all or let your wife drive it on trail rides. 

83K10 wrote: Why don't you rebuild the rubi rear end and swap both of them under the red TJ. You could have a spare jeep for a couple of hundred $$$ and some time. You could always sell if you didn't use it at all or let your wife drive it on trail rides.

i need the money from the sales of the axles and associated parts to fund the big stuff.  I think I found a buyer for the TJ.

Oh well. It was just an idea.

Jake I hear scrap metal is going up a bit again.

Bravo, Case!

It's really amazing how long it takes to actually get stuff done isn't it? At least your making progress.

Enjoying the build and the good humor. 

Progress!

I got the bumper painted up.  It looks like somebody dropped a gallon of paint on it and then spread it around with their fingers:



I also got wheels for my tires and got the tires mounted on the wheels:




I thought I was doing pretty good until disaster struck...I was working on the rear crossmember, drilling holes to install the new bumper when I noticed that the Jeep was sitting kind of crooked and was actually not on one of the 4 jackstands holding it up.  I took a second to look and realized that the weight of the jeep was being pushed forward and was about to fall off the jackstands.   The front stands were seriously bowed and there was barely any weight at all on the rear stands.

So in usual fashion, I stopped all progress to fix a mistake I had made in setting the stands up.  Part of the problem was that the jackstands were placed to close together and were not distributing the weight front to back as well.  Another problem was that the jackstands were set up to high which let them lean quite  a bit.  I decided to punt rather than play the clock and so began the careful task of resetting all the jackstands without dumping my jeep over in the garage.  Here is what I ended up with:




Much better.  Now without the threat of death or dismemberment either by falling jeep or pissed off wife, I continued with the back bumper installation:



The hitch is not permanent, its just a proof of concept.

Now I could reinstall the gas tank in its new location:



A close up of the new location versus the old location: 



I'm pointing to the old mounting location.  You can see that quite a bit of room was gained.  This is good because this pig had to fit:



Here it is under the Jeep.  I am still playing with ride height, but this is pretty close:



And one more from the front just because I am so happy to have this massive sumbitch outta my shop:



The next step is a little body massage and some head scratching about ride height and travel and then 4 link calculations.  Hopefully I can get this knocked out soon and then sell an organ or two so I can afford to buy shocks and a sway bar.

it just looks wide because there are no fender flares on.  The inside 1/4" of tread tucks nicely into the wheel wells 

Oh boy!  Grab a beer (unless you're at work...wait, its ok if you work at a bar), cuz this one is gonna take a minute!

The first order of business was finding out how to fit these big ol tires after the axle relocation.  The interesting thing was after flare removal the wheel wells would almost accommodate a 42" tire, especially at the width I am currently running.  However, since I am moving the axle back a few inches, I am going to have to remove some sheetmetal.  Carefully, oh so carefully I scribbled a new wheel well line onto the body:



I know there are multiple lines drawn.  It made sense at the time.  I'm pretty sure I cut on the right one.  Let me tell you honestly, it was freakin nerve wracking cutting on a jeep that I'm still paying for.  I'm not gonna lie to you and tell you that I just jumped up with a sawzall and hacked away.  The first cut took about an hour:



A passerby alerted me to the fact that I was grinding and cutting and generally making sparks fly near a gast tank with exposed fuel lines.  It never occurred to me to check.  Oh well I lived, but I would highly recommend that when throwing sparks at a giant bomb, that you keep said sparks from contacting gasoline fumes.  For those of you keeping score:  Death and/or dismemberment: 0  Dumb luck 2. 

So the first cut took an hour. I sweated and moaned and gnawed fingernails until it was done.  After seeing the result of my work, I gleefully moved to the other side and made the cut on the other end in 5 minutes:



Now, you may be wondering why I would take a perfectly good body and hack it so badly.  Believe me when I say I wouldn't be happy with these cuts if they were gonna show.  They will be covered up by body armor, to provide strength to the areas where tires/rocks will come in frequent contact.

On the passenger side of new(er) jeeps government mandated facist environmental bullspit is required to be mounted.  Now I bear an unreasonable amount of rage to this piece of drek.  Since I purchased this Jeep new, this piece of equipment has done nothing but thrown check engine lights and basically caused me heartache.  I was thrilled to have the ability to remove it.  Since it threw CELs anyways I won't miss it:



The shelf this was mounted to was in the way of my new tires.  It needed to go:



So I took it out:



While removing this, my grinder just jumped up and bit me:



Fortunately, my glove and my cat like reflexes saved me.  Check the scoreboard:  Death and/or dismemberment: 0  Dumb luck: 3.

Now it was a time to build my lower links.  Taking all the pieces I have already purchased, an appropriate lower was created.  Here is an example of one compared to my old  lower link:



And the uppers:



I'll show actual link measurements in a minute.  Step into my office and I'll show you my calculations:





It took several hours of measuring, calculating, measuring, head scratching, measuring, more calculating, measuring, fitting, measuring, adjustments, measuring, final calculations and placement, and measuring.  Finally, the suspension was built.  Here are a series of pictures showing it off:



Tire at full stuff:



Clearance of diff cover and gas tank skid at full stuff:



Full stuff on the outside:



Full stuff on the inside:



Past full droop:



Notice the pinion angles at full stuff/full droop    Total up travel about 5.5".  Total down travel 10+" (pictured is about 20").  The overall height of the vehicle is about the same at ride height on 42s than it was on my 37s.  This 1/2 of the suspension is freaking incredible.  I am so freaking stoked its not even describable.  Just seeing the axle finally mounted and seeing it cycle was an incredible feeling

Huge thanks to my overlord in crime: Jordan Townsend (JRTOffroad).  Without his dedication and enthusiasm for my project, none of this would be possible!

Nick, your latest build was a big inspiration for doing this.   After seeing how stable your truck was, I had to try and replicate your brilliant design in Jeep form!

Very nice Case! I can totaly sympathize with putting a vehicle with payments under the knife. That's why mine still has a short arm    Between the payments, the fact that it's a DD I've stayed away from it. If I can find a deal on 1 tons then I'll re-think it and a small block swap.

Mike

Bump for an update...